


The Dog, The Cat, and Three Americanos

by PleasureTrade



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: Alfie is an annoying customer, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bisexual Disaster Tommy Shelby, Canon-Typical Gang Behavior, Enemies to Lovers, Eventual Romance, Eventual Sex, M/M, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Past Drug Use, Prison, Sort Of, Tommy is his favorite barista, coffee shop AU, more tags as I write sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-12-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 08:01:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 13,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25539958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PleasureTrade/pseuds/PleasureTrade
Summary: Alfie is babbling on about something, probably quoting Shakespeare again or doing something else asinine, and Tommy is staring with his best poker face at the torturously slow stream of espresso.orTommy is just trying to suffer through his life as a cafe employee with a sordid past, Alfie is just trying to drink three americanos a day and bother the pretty barista with the blue eyes.
Relationships: Tommy Shelby/Alfie Solomons
Comments: 52
Kudos: 259





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> hi everyone!!!! long time no write.
> 
> i started this months ago when i saw a tweet about how coffee shop AUs should actually all be enemies to lovers on account of customers are terrible, and of course i instantly imagined these boys.
> 
> this is about 75% done so if i go too long between updates PLEASE BOTHER ME. I PROMISE I'M GOING TO FINISH THIS. not sure if it's going to be mature or explicit yet, so i apologize for the lack of rating for a bit while i finish it up.
> 
> EDIT: also, shout out to my friend conrad!! he helped me with some barista stuff since i've never worked at a cafe before lmao. i work a diff service industry job so i'm familiar with Customer Shenanigans. he doesn't read peaky blinders fic but i told him he could read mine so fingers crossed i convert him, i'm coming for u conrad

Tommy sees him as soon as he walks in. He’s hard to miss really, though Tommy can’t quite place why. The man’s not particularly tall, he’s not loud (at least initially, Tommy learns), he’s not dressed any more flashy than Tommy is himself. And yet, he does an excruciating triple-take when the man comes to stand at the counter.

The first time, Tommy is working the bar so he doesn’t actually interact with him much, just strains his ears to listen to his voice for some fucking reason. When there’s no name with the order on his little screen, he feels a small hint of something like disappointment.

Their fingers don’t brush as he hands him his drink, they don’t exchange any words aside from “large americano?” and “yeah, thanks, mate,” they don’t even linger for a second longer than necessary. But on his way out, the man turns his head back a little to catch his gaze, raises a hand in goodbye, and Tommy doesn’t return it only because he’s suddenly forgotten how to move.

-

The second time, now that's where it really begins. Tommy is on the register for only another five minutes, less if his coworker wants to be nice, when the man walks in again. He’s not even fully at the counter yet before he’s ordering, voice raised unnecessarily loud as he beelines for him. Tommy is taken aback enough that he doesn’t even get the chance to plaster on a pleasant estimation of a smile.

“Medium americano, double.” he barks, and something about it sends a jolt of annoyance down Tommy’s spine.

The bloke hasn’t even really looked at him yet, is scanning the pastry case and then the menu like he’s going to order something else, even though Tommy knows he isn’t going to, but he has to wait for him to do it anyway. Tommy tells him his total and still no eye contact. He hands over his card and when Tommy takes it he finally deigns to look down at him like he’s a living, breathing human and not a coffee machine. The guy squints at him a little, just for a second.

“Name for the order?” Tommy can’t help but ask as he hands the card back. There’s no one else in line and there’s no other orders being made so he doesn’t actually need it. He hopes the man doesn’t notice.

“Alfie.” the man says, taking an extra fraction of a second to scrutinize him before taking his card. Shit. Was he being suspicious? Why had he asked? Why did he care? Relief washes over him as the man, Alfie, walks away without taking his receipt.

When Tommy is walking out after his shift, changed back into his street clothes, Alfie is still there with his drink. He’s sat alone reading at a table much too large for his needs, situated near the door with the best view of the nearby park, because of course he is. Tommy realizes then that he’s going to have to walk by him to leave and for a moment he seriously contemplates turning around and going out the back purely because Alfie might interact with him.

Shaking his head to himself, Tommy hurries to the door before he changes his mind. Suddenly, he’s self conscious about the way he walks for some reason, or feels like maybe he’s left a part of his shirt untucked, or maybe like he’s got his jacket on inside out. Hell, Alfie is looking up at him as he tries to pass by.

“Later, Thomas.” he says, fingers keeping his place in his book as he half-closes it. For a moment, Tommy is startled because he knows for a fact he’s never told this man his name, but then remembers that name tags are part of their dress code.

“It’s Tommy.” he deadpans, pulling open the door to escape the conversation.

“Right. See you, then.” Alfie returns, sounding either extraordinarily disinterested or unpleasantly smug. It leaves a feeling under Tommy’s skin that he isn’t able to shake for hours.

-

A few days later, Tommy opens. He’s there with his manager, Louis, the only person who works there that’s older than Tommy, and they enjoy a companionable silence before the day starts. Opening shifts are much easier for Tommy because they give him an excuse to ignore his poor sleeping habits. Tossing and turning until finally giving up at three in the morning is excusable when you have to leave the house by four anyway. It makes the dysfunction feel productive, at least.

They’re still fifteen minutes from opening, Tommy is setting the pastries into the case for the day, when Alfie opens the door that Tommy could have sworn was locked. The relaxing jazz playing over the speakers suddenly sounds grating and frantic.

“Thomas!” Alfie bellows, sounding positively enthusiastic while his face remains stoically alert. For a brief moment, Tommy feels like he’s in trouble, but the feeling passes when he remembers that he isn’t the one barging in before opening.

“We’re not open yet, Alfie. And it’s _Tommy_.” he replies, exasperated.

“Well, doors unlocked, innit?”

Louis must have tuned their conversation, because he pipes up from somewhere behind Tommy.

“Sorry! Must’ve forgot to lock it when I came in after you, Tom.” he squeaks.

For christ’s sake, can no one just call him Tommy?

“Sir, feel free to have a seat, we’ll be with you in just a moment.” Louis offers. Tommy wants to roll his eyes, because he has a feeling Alfie doesn’t actually need coffee at this hour for any pressing reason and that he’s simply going to order his americano and drink it lackadaisically in the best spot in the cafe like a prideful, territorial dog. He deliberately turns his back to Alfie as he continues setting out the pastries.

Thankfully, Louis starts on the register so Tommy assumes he’ll be able to escape any insufferable interactions with Alfie when they’re finally open. Only, when he serves Alfie his americano…

“You got cream back there?” Alfie asks, brow furrowed like he’s considering climbing over the counter and rooting around for himself.

“We’ve got cream over there.” Tommy gestures to the table of various creamers and sweeteners across the room, where normal people doctor their own drinks. Alfie turns his head, then looks back at Tommy, back at the table, back at Tommy.

“Right, well, I’m assuming _you_ also have cream back _there_?”

 _Oh, for fuck’s_ -

“Yeah.” Tommy bites out, snatching a carafe from the fridge and sliding it over the counter far more combatively than he should. Alfie snatches it up without missing a beat, tutting in mock disappointment.

“Now now, Tom, anger is like a full-hot horse and all that.”

Oh god, now the bastard is quoting Shakespeare at him? He isn’t sure why he’s surprised that Alfie is the type of customer to force insufferably bizarre conversations on a captive audience, but he is. Maybe it has something to do with his appearance. He doesn’t look like the type of man to enjoy conversation with strangers, looks more like he’d be partial to meat and potatoes and fist fights and pretty women, only speaking at length when he’s got a few drinks in him.

Alfie dashes an insignificant amount of cream into his drink before setting the carafe back down deliberately gently. Tommy hums, attempting to cooly disguise his level of irritation.

“Yeah well, I’m not really allowed my way, now am I? Got a job I need to keep.”

A sharp look flashes in Alfie’s eyes. Whether it’s because he’s taken the words as a threat or because he’s realized that Tommy recognized the quote, he isn’t sure.  
“Ah, a tamed stallion. Must get awfully cooped up in your pasture here, yeah?” Alfie says and Tommy’s stomach sinks instantly. His words ring truer than he knows, leaving Tommy short of both words and breath for just a moment. Bothersome exchanges with strange customers didn’t usually touch on anything personal for him.

“Enjoy your drink.” He spits before turning back to the bar, pretending he’s got something pressing to attend to.

-

One day, Alfie arrives in the early afternoon with what looks to be a bag brimming with takeaway containers. There’s no doubt in Tommy’s mind that he’s about to sit down and spend an excessive amount of time consuming said outside food, and his blood is already simmering at the idea of it. He wonders if he’ll even make a beautiful mess for Tommy to clean later too.

He’s not the one working the register so he doesn’t get the pleasure of telling Alfie that he’s not allowed outside food inside the cafe, and then he’s dumbfounded when his coworker (plainly aware) hands Alfie’s receipt over with a smile, not so much as mentioning it. And sure, customers do this from time to time and yes, okay, maybe it’s never bothered Tommy before, but it’s _Alfie_ for god’s sake. The man has only been in maybe half a dozen times but Tommy already knows he's an absolute menace.

When he brings his cup up for a refill, Tommy pointedly stares at the massive mess he’s made of the table. Alfie seems oblivious to this though as he rambles on about the weather or some such thing Tommy hears about fifty times a day, only there’s an over-the-top sort of twist on it because the subject leads him here and there and suddenly he’s talking about dog breeds and even if he was listening Tommy couldn’t fucking follow it.

He places Alfie’s second americano of the day on the counter and again attempts to purposefully stare at the food mess Alfie’s made. It’s hard to tell if it registers because Alfie is still droning on, animating wildly with his free hand. Tommy leans on the counter and pretends to listen as his irritation slowly climbs higher and higher.

“See, that’s why Bullmastiffs are utterly superior, mate. They look like right dopes, lull you into a sense of false tranquility, yeah, and then-BAM! Soon as you try to make off with my seven thousand pound, custom mounted stag head or my first edition Marlowe he’s got your bullocks between his teeth and-”

“You know, we don’t really allow outside food in here.” Tommy interrupts.

All of the sudden Alfie looks positively amused, which is not the reaction Tommy had hoped for. There’s a glint in his eye, almost like he had been waiting for Tommy to mention it. “Yeah, well, I’ll clean up after myself if that’s what you’re all worked up about, alright? Just thought I’d maximize my time in your fine establishment, spending my precious money here, by bringing my luncheon with me, s’all.”

“It’s a violation of health code.” Tommy supplies, although he isn’t sure if it’s true, and he’s never really cared before anyway. He’s not a grass, for fuck’s sake, but Alfie is close to turning him into one purely out of personal spite.

“Health code? Oh, beg pardon mate, won’t happen again! Very scary, me coming in here with my kebab, violating your very pertinent health code-”

“Just _clean up_ after yourself, yeah?” Tommy is surprised at how venomous he sounds saying it, hopes that his coworkers don’t overhear him.

Alfie levels a wild gaze at him, but still looks far more amused than Tommy would prefer. “Not an animal, am I?” Tommy wants to reply with an ‘I don’t know, could have fooled me with that beard and those manners,’ but bites his tongue and pointedly turns his attention back to the bar.

By the time Tommy is leaving for the day, Alfie is already gone. He is initially begrudgingly satisfied to find Alfie’s table totally cleared, but upon closer inspection he finds some sort of little object near the corner closest the door. He glances down at it as he leaves and finds a ten pound note, intricately and bizarrely folded into the shape of a little dog, standing up on all fours. Tommy crumples it in his hand and reluctantly shoves it into his pocket.

-

Unfortunately, Alfie secures himself as a regular very quickly. He’s there nearly every time Tommy works, he knows all the staff by name, and (this is the worst part) all of his coworkers end up loving him for some ungodly reason.

Despite his constant bad manners, his unacceptable volume, his horrendously cryptic and over-familiar conversational skills, or lack thereof, and beyond, everyone but Tommy ends up sickeningly fond of him. “Oh I hated him at first, sure,” his coworker Bryony tells him one day “but he sort of grows on you. I think he means well, at least.” She even laughs a bit after she says it, all cheeky smile and misplaced positivity.

Sometimes, when he isn’t too busy attempting to talk his ear off or reading while standing up near the bar, Alfie will just _watch_ Tommy. It’s almost like he sensed that he preferred to be making the drinks when Alfie was there so that he didn’t have to talk to him at the register, and decided that he needed to do _something_ to make either possibility miserable.

Finally, after a few occasions where Alfie finds it necessary to inspect him the entire time he’s using the espresso machine, he snaps.

“You know something? Staring does not, in fact, make me make your drink faster.” He says it without making eye contact because he often has a difficult time looking Alfie in the face, but he prays it’s taken as indifference.

“Now, is that really what you think I’m trying to accomplish, Thomas? Simply looking, yeah, just using the eyes what god himself gave me. Simple as that, no ulterior motives to be found, mate.”

“Looking for the sake of looking, eh?”

“Yeah, ‘s right.”

Tommy places Alfie’s drink in front of him, a drip sloshing out of the cup and onto the saucer beneath it. “Nothing better to do?”

“Nah, mate, not by a biblically vast long shot.” Alfie quips, bringing his drink to his lips and taking a measured sip. There’s a beat of eye contact between them and Tommy nearly squares up, like he’s going to have to jump over the counter and wrestle Alfie to the ground, but then Alfie is turning casually and returning to his perch by the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok  
> listen  
> i know this seemed like it was going to be a cute cafe fic but it truly deeply got away from me so <:) uh.. ....... fhhfjgg  
> also, full disclosure, i'm sort of writing this in an alternate timeline where maybe a third world war happened or something, but i've so far gotten away with almost finishing this fic without mentioning it so i'm going to leave that up to yall's imaginations. sorry bout it

It’s Tommy last day of work for the week, only an hour until his shift is over, and Alfie has only had the chance to enrage him twice. If he can escape without any further incidents he’ll consider himself lucky, although his hopes are anything but high.

And, as if summoned by mere thought, Alfie meanders over to the register when there’s a short lapse in customers. Tommy pretends not to notice him as Alfie leans on the half-wall dividing the bar from the rest of the shop, silently begging god or whoever to make him change his mind about whatever he’s about to say.

"You ever think about changing the music in here, Tom?” He asks, fiddling with one of his many rings.

“No. I don’t. Corporate or whoever gives us playlists and we play them.”

“Yeah, right, figured as much, but could you, you know, play a _different_ playlist for example?”

Tommy drops his head back and looks at the ceiling, attempting to gather all of his patience because he can just feel his two other coworkers eavesdropping on this horrid conversation and he doesn’t need anyone gossiping about him being rude to their precious favorite. “Technically, Alfie, yes. I could hit a different button on the computer, but I don’t. Because I don’t care. And even if I did, it’s still company policy.” Tommy responds, now tapping idly at the screen in front of him like he’s doing something useful on it.

Alfie hums. “Sure, sure. But what if, and hear me out now, what if you did? Change it? From this godawful jazz music you lot play in here all the time? I’m here nearly every other day and it’s all sort of bled into one, long, perilous assortment of brass and piano keys and erratic drum nonsense. Starting to hear it in my sleep, I am, Thomas.”

Tommy tenses his jaw because what he wouldn’t give to simply hear fucking _jazz_ music when he’s trying to sleep, night after night, year after year, as opposed to-

Alfie ducks into his line of sight, snapping his fingers in front of his face. Tommy rears his head back just slightly, realizing he’d gotten lost in thought. “You in there, mate? Went all distant in the face, you did, though I’m not sure how you managed it, what with this,” Alfie waves his hands animatedly as he finds the words, “calamitous _racket_ you people call music playing.”

Tommy was familiar with having lapses like that, practiced in recovering from them. He rights himself promptly, standing up a little straighter. “If you don’t like jazz, Alfie, why don’t you spend your time somewhere else? A cafe isn’t where I’d go if I was trying to avoid it.”

“Now, now, you’ve got me all wrong, see. I enjoy myself some jazz, I just don’t particularly like _this_ jazz. Whoever picked it out is an absolute buffoon what wouldn’t know good music if it jumped up and bit them in the arse.”

Tommy grinds his teeth. “Right. Noted. I’ll make sure to send a strongly worded email to my superiors just for you, Alfie.” he says, words soaked with apathy. Alfie just smirks at him under his moustache, as if pleased to get on his nerves.

And Tommy supposes he is, guesses that that’s why he does it repeatedly to him and not so severely to anyone else. He can't count the amount of times he's watched Alfie interact with a coworker and the most insufferable thing they get is overfamiliarity or loudness, while he gets all of the most unbearable bits. Tommy glances up as Alfie ambles back to his seat, wondering why he could possibly feel the need to single him out. He tries to forget about it as a cluster of customers come in, but finds it a bit harder than usual to plaster on the smile.  
  


-

One day, Tommy gets an order for a pour over, which ordinarily would have been nothing to worry about; only the little name along with it on his screen reads "ALFIE" in the familiar, overly-bright yellow text. Alfie had never, ever ordered anything besides an americano and Tommy is immediately wary. He understands this feeling as maybe misplaced, but then again his skepticism over Alfie usually proved warranted.

The thing about a pour over is that it takes a long minute, a quiet one of just standing and pouring, so Alfie will have extra time to bother him. He's just set the filter in when Alfie leans over the counter, resting on his elbows, inching that much closer to him. Alfie has apparently chosen the “stand and stare” option today and, as always, Tommy doesn’t know if he prefers it or not.

Tommy tries not to be hyperaware of Alfie’s gaze as he pours hot water over the filter, but he has to wet the whole thing evenly and it's taking a long time and there's nothing else to focus on and christ he can feel the heat creeping up his neck.

After he's dumped the hot water, he makes the mistake of glancing up at Alfie, who is of course still watching him intently, wordlessly. He'd hoped that Alfie had gotten bored of him finally and turned his attention somewhere else for once, but that was very wishful thinking. The brief moment of eye contact has Tommy’s flush inching higher up onto his cheeks. He swears that he can see Alfie smirking out of the corner of his eye over it.

Tommy swallows thickly as he fills the kettle again. “Staring for the sake of staring again?” He asks, unable to keep the silence.

“Right you are, Thomas. Watching your deft little hands make my expensive coffee drinks is my newest hobby, I ‘spose.” He says it right as Tommy begins the grueling process of pouring the water through the grounds. It’s almost a compliment, Tommy thinks, if it’s sincere. His face feels impossibly warmer.

Finally, Tommy slides the drink over to Alfie, who takes it in one hand before taking a steady drink, without standing fully upright. Tommy finds himself frozen in place, looking slightly down at Alfie who is making an intense sort of eye contact with him. Predatory almost, only it’s warmer than that, and Tommy’s knees feel all of the sudden very weak.

He clears his throat and turns back to the next order on his screen without a word.

-

_Tommy stands at the doors to his hotel balcony, contemplates opening them to the hard downpour of rain, to the harsh wind. It would feel nice against his hot skin._

_“Thomas,” Alfie says from somewhere within the room behind him, “come here.”_

_Tommy tries to obey, tries to turn into Alfie who is waiting just there, closer than he should have been, but his arms are already snaking around his hips from behind, around his waist, running his fingertips painfully soft along his body. Tommy breathes heavily. Alfie’s chest is broad and solid and too-warm against his back. Bare, skin to skin._

_Alfie weaves a dizzying hand under his waistband, slipping over his arse and between his cheeks while his other hand rubs gently against the front of his pants, just ghosting over the fabric there “What’s my order, Thomas?” Alfie asks, a finger pressing in at his entrance. Tommy can’t answer immediately even though he knows the answer, thinks it desperately in hopes to say it out loud._

_“Come now, what is it?” Alfie goads. A slick finger slips into him, stretching him insistently while Alfie's other hand still only gives his cock the most minimal attention. He can’t answer for some reason, he just can’t, his head is swimming and his tongue is firmly tied and the stretch of Alfie's thick finger is totally consuming._

_“What’s the difference between an americano and a latte?” Alfie asks, beard and lips brushing his ear._

_He plants his hands on the glass of the doors in front of him, couldn’t possibly keep holding himself up. He tries willing himself to speak, but he can only choke out a broken approximation of a moan when Alfie twists and crooks his finger inside of him. Alfie presses in another finger and it slides in so easily that Tommy is amazed because he hasn’t let anyone do this to him in ages, doesn't understand how it could be this easy or why he can't speak. Finally, Alfie grips his cock through his pants, just enough friction for Tommy to desperately rut against-_

The shrill tone of his phone alarm beside him has Tommy jerking awake, body tense and eyes wide. A smooth heavy warmth lingers on his skin, a haunting pleasure following him into the land of the living. He wants to swipe it off of him like an insect, only it’s far too vast. His cock throbs insistently where it’s pressed against the mattress. Fuck. What the hell.

Dreams were not uncommon to Tommy, but pleasant ones certainly were. He couldn’t even begin to remember the last time he had a nice dream, not to mention one like that. And then a sickly, thick feeling of uneasiness creeps in at the thought. He’d had a sex dream. About _Alfie._ A customer. A customer he loathed.

His head is swimming and his skull fucking hurts and his impulse, second only to taking his cock in hand, is to roll over to the bedside table and open a sweet little parcel of heroin. Only, he doesn’t have a convenient little baggy, he doesn’t have a syringe, he doesn’t even have a lighter. The bedside table is gone too, the flat, the city, all swapped for his new pristine life. He’s clean now. And yet, the impulse is still there, always with him like a fucking ghost.

He stares at his bedside table for a long moment anyway, mind churning uneasily. But it was morning now, and time to leave his drab little flat and put on his drab little apron and make people their absurd drinks and try not to think about anything at all. Having a bizarre dream about some idiot who drinks three americanos a day was not going to change that reality for him. Whether or not he’s grateful for this truth, he’s unsure.

-

It’s a strangely warm morning, something that Tommy dreads because it means it’s too hot for a jacket. He covets layers between him and the outside world and resents days where London doesn’t bring him the promised suitable weather. Louis is already inside when he gets there, but the front door is still locked. He’s fishing his key from his pocket when a familiar voice calls for him from the car park, “Tommy!”

Fuck. It had been quite a while since he’d made a random stop at his job. Tommy had gotten far too comfortable with only phone calls and monthly meetings at the other man's office.

“How’s my most well-behaved parolee, hm?” Mosley asks, coming to rest next to Tommy with his shoulder against the cafe window. Tommy peers inside and sees Louis glance up, spot Mosley, and smile apologetically, knowingly at him. ‘Parolee.’ Tommy hates being called that, hates being reduced to someone who lives under someone else’s thumb in a single word.

“Tired, Mr. Mosley.” Tommy replies, pulling his key from his pocket but hesitating to open the door. He’d rather not have this conversation in front of his manager in a completely empty cafe.

“Up late, were you?”

Tommy tenses his jaw, runs his tongue along his bottom teeth. This was not what he fucking needed today on top of how his morning started. “No, just tired. It’s early.” Tommy mumbles, trying his best not to fidget under Mosley’s gaze.

“You weren’t drinking last night, were you? No drugs?”

Tommy resists the urge to smash his fist directly into Mosley’s teeth. He clears his throat. “Nope.”

“So if I gave you a breathalyzer right now, or a drug test when you got off work, you’d pass?” The way he says it it’s like he doesn’t fucking believe him. He never sounds like he believes him. That was part of his job, wasn’t it? To just sound so skeptical day in and day out that Tommy eventually broke and got himself put back in prison. Tommy isn’t having any of it.

“Sure would, Mr. Mosley.”

“That’s good to hear, Thomas. Only one more month of your probation, you know. Then you’ll be free to waste away your nights as you see fit and I won’t be able to do anything at all about it.” Mosley smiles at him, high cheeks and dead eyes. It makes Tommy’s stomach churn. “Mind if I pop in? Haven’t had my tea yet.”

“We’re not set up-”

“I can wait, Thomas. I’m a patient man, you know this.”

Mosley sits there in silence for an excruciating amount of time, just watching him set up for the day like somehow he’s going to do something illegal or against his agreed upon probation rules. Tommy knows what tea he drinks and prepares it preemptively in hopes that it’ll lessen their interaction while he insists on being there. He brings him an entire pot because he knows he’ll just ask for more in order to sit and sip it for as long as he possibly can.

It had been a blessedly long time since he’d stopped in at his job and Tommy regrets not being better prepared for it mentally. His skin still feels damp and uncomfortable after his dream this morning and Mosley’s stare isn’t making it any better. Was drifting undisturbed, uninterrupted through the miserable remainder of his life too much to ask?

After an agitating stretch of Mosley sitting and watching, there are finally enough morning guests popping in and out to distract Tommy from the uneasy feeling in his gut. He falls into an almost-calm routine of making drinks and passing them over the counter, one after another, just like any other day. Until, of course, Alfie walks in.

Tommy’s first instinct is to toss off his apron and run into the back room like a scared rat but, even if Mosley wasn’t still watching him like a hawk, he can’t. So he waits and pretends not to notice the combined heat of both Mosley and now Alfie, from over by the register, just fucking _staring_ at him as he tries to do his fucking job.

The order for Alfie’s americano is familiar by now and Tommy desperately begins the process before he has a chance to walk over to the bar to wait for his drink, the dream too fresh in his brain to handle a second more of the man than he has to. He’s already ground the beans and loaded the espresso machine and is filling a mug with hot water when Alfie leans into the counter, hand propping him up. _What’s my order, Thomas_? God damn his brain, he can feel his blood run hot at the memory.

Today, Alfie says nothing while he watches, not that that makes it much easier. Tommy almost wishes he would talk just so there wasn’t so much silence for his brain to fill. _Come now, what is it?_ Christ. He tries fruitlessly to direct his mind elsewhere.

After what must have been an eon, he gently tilts the espresso into the water before sliding it across the counter to Alfie. In an attempt to make absolutely zero eye contact, his gaze lands on Alfie's hands as he reaches for his drink and bloody hell his fingers are thick and-

Tommy's heart stops. There, in plain sight, right on the back of Alfie's hands, are matching crown tattoos. Familiar crown tattoos. Tommy had seen very similar ones in prison.

Suddenly a couple of things become apparent. Firstly, he realizes that Alfie is almost definitely a criminal. Secondly, "interrelation of any kind" with someone with a criminal record is a strike against him that could land him back in prison and his fucking Offender Manager is sitting across the room, right there, _watching_ them.

"Oh, treacle, I asked for this iced."

Tommy's blood runs even colder. "You never order it iced." his voice cracks embarrassingly.

Alfie looks at him for a moment like he's grown six heads, half of them horses and one of them a dog. "Yeah, well, 's a bit balmy today, innit? Thought I'd switch it up, keep things lively. Man not allowed to ask for his drink cold purely on the grounds that he's got it hot before?"

Tommy barely hears him because he's already scrambling to remake the fucking drink so he can cut this conversation off, knocking the grounds out of the portafilter so hard it rattles his skull. Alfie shifts in surprise at this, not startled but apparently confused. This day was entirely too much.

"My my, Thomas, no need to take out your anger on the innocent machinery here. Not his fault your pretty eyes didn't read the order right, now is it?"

Tommy wants to scream because he knows Mosley is still watching. Did the order even say iced? Why didn't Alfie say anything before? Seeing as he stares like his life depends on it when Tommy makes his goddamn americanos, he should know by now how they’re made. Did he just say his eyes were pretty?

Alfie is babbling on about something, probably quoting Shakespeare again or doing something else asinine, and Tommy is staring with his best poker face at the torturously slow stream of espresso. If Mosley saw the tattoos on Alfie's hands he would take the greatest pleasure in threatening Tommy with it, especially since Alfie has been at the bar staring at and talking to him far longer than any other customer has, obviously a regular.

Finally, he dashes the espresso into a glass of ice water and sets it on the counter, turning away before Alfie has the chance to say anything else to him. There are no other orders to busy himself with so he begins frantically cleaning messes that he hasn't yet made, praying that the day would just swallow him whole.

A blessed half hour goes by in a jittery calmness, both Alfie and Mosley minding their own business for once, when the latter decides it's finally time to bother him again.

Mosley sets his emptied pot and cup on the counter, pushing them forward in a shallow show of kindness. "So, who was that chap up here talking to you earlier? The one with the beard." he asks coolly. Tommy feels the blood drain from his face.

“Made his drink hot instead of iced, had to make it again.” Tommy tells him, trying to busy himself with tidying. Mosley hums.

“Who is he, though, a regular?”

“Yeah. Don’t know who he is.”

“Come now, you must know his name if he’s a regular, Thomas. Are you lying to me?”

Tommy tries his best not to break something. “Alfie. His name is Alfie, that’s all I know about him.”

Mosley levels a sharp gaze at him, as if he’s trying to psychically will Tommy to give him more information. Over the last eight months of his parole Mosley has been unwaveringly skeptical of him, in everything from drug use to his work schedule to what he bought at the grocery store. This was no different, only this time he may _have_ actually been violating his parole plan because he’s almost positive that Alfie had been involved in something and, by the look of the tattoo ink, it wasn’t so many years ago.

Mosley hums, giving him a bland sort of smile. “Well. It’s time for me to get on with my day. Be a good boy, Thomas.”

“Goodbye, Mr. Mosley.” Thomas replies, not even attempting to sound warm or casual.

“I’ll see you at our next meeting.” Mosley is lingering for some reason, narrowing his eyes like he’s waiting for something.

“That you will.” There’s a silence between them for a moment until Mosley finally gives and turns his godforsaken back to leave. Tommy can’t seem to relax his body for the rest of his shift.

-

When Tommy emerges from the back room in the late afternoon, he’s greeted by a nearby Alfie. He had obviously been waiting for him, and Tommy shoots a glance and Louis that he hopes communicates ‘ _please don’t let our unhinged customers wait around for me, what are you, stupid?_ ’ but he’s met with a blank stare.

“Off now, yeah?” Alfie asks. Obviously he’s fucking off, he’s got a bag slung across his chest and no apron to be seen.

“Yeah.”

“Mind if I walk you out?” for the love of all that is holy, does this man have zero boundaries? Still, for some reason Tommy wants to say yes, only he realizes very quickly that he _can’t_. Mosley hadn't left so long ago so there's still a chance he could be watching outside, waiting to catch him doing something scandalous like living his life. Mosley seeing him with Alfie, who he had basically just insisted on not knowing at all, could be disastrous.

He feels almost guilty when he says “Maybe another time, Alfie. In a bit of a hurry today.”

“Alright, alright, sure. Can I ask you one question then?” Alfie shifts his jaw and it would normally register as a nervous tick to Tommy, only Alfie looks intensely confident as always.

Tommy raises his eyebrows and averts his gaze in a silent agreement, kicking himself for probably betraying his nervous impatience.

“Who was that fellow up there at the bar earlier? Posh looking fellow with the weedy little moustache.”

“Why?” Tommy spits. Christ, he's being jumpy, isn’t he?

“I mean, and tell me to fuck off if I’m being a nuisance, yeah? But that man seems to have gotten under your skin and so far as I can tell all he did was bring you his fucking teacup. He say something disagreeable to you, or you just didn’t like his ‘tache?”

“Why are you asking, Alfie? Irritating customers certainly aren’t out of the ordinary.”

“Well, I’m asking, Thomas, because I spend quite a lot of time and quite a bit of money in your fine establishment and I’ve grown to like it a measurable amount. You may find it difficult to believe but everyone here seems to greatly enjoy my company, all except for you maybe,” Alfie nods at him in what nearly looks like a reverent sort of bow, “and I find myself a bit protective of it, alright? Even of your sorry, avoidant arse, for whatever reason.”

Tommy takes a moment to think on the words, breathes in deep to steady himself. “So what are you saying, Alfie? You going to deal with my problem customers for me? Think I need protection from a posh man with a weedy little moustache?”

Alfie suddenly looks almost embarrassed at that, as if he hadn’t realized that overstepping a grown man’s boundaries was a bit rude until just this moment. For the very first time, Alfie doesn’t respond, only stares back at him contemplatively. Tommy shakes his head in annoyance, but also maybe a little pity for some reason. Maybe he was a little too sour.

“He’s my Offender Manager.” he says, hiking his bag higher on his shoulder as he hurriedly makes his way for the door, not bothering to look for Alfie’s reaction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [follow me on tumblr](https://pleasuretrade.tumblr.com/) pls i need more peaky friends


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> uh oh!
> 
> [check end notes for behind the scenes sorta stuff if u like that kind of thing]

Tommy spends his blessed few days off holed up in his apartment. Ada calls him to catch up, but sometimes their conversations still just feel like her asking him if he’s been doing drugs without really asking it. The thinly veiled ‘so, how are you doing with everything?’s got old fast but he has no energy at this point to do anything but humor them.

Polly drives in and brings him some takeaway, which she puts in his fridge herself, and tells him things like ‘you _will_ eat’ and ‘you live close to a perfectly good park, I hope you’re taking advantage of it’ and Tommy mostly just sits at his window and smokes while she passively reprimands him. She asks him what he’s going to do once his probation is up and he tells her the honest truth, which is that he doesn’t know.

His first day back at work that week, Alfie isn’t even there, which should be ideal but is honestly a bit annoying because he’d lost even more sleep than usual worrying about it. What if he brought up what Tommy had told him last time? What if he asked why he’d been to prison? The least the bastard could do was show up.

The next day, after more sleep lost, Alfie graces Tommy with his presence. Only, Alfie is quiet. Polite and gentle and not talking overly much and almost fucking normal, for christ’s sake. It chills Tommy only because it feels like the calm before a storm. But then, most calms felt that way to him these days. “Post traumatic stress,” his doctors told him. They barely exchange any words and it leaves Tommy feeling somehow more tense than a regular day with Alfie.

The day after is much the same, only Tommy is on the register this time and when Alfie fails to do anything insufferably abnormal, he finds himself… disappointed? He should be glad. Alfie has been the bane of his existence for weeks now, he should honestly be celebrating. But it feels wrong, eerily so.

When Tommy is leaving after his shift, Alfie is still seated by the door, lost in his book with the last bit of his third americano sitting in front of him. His heart is hammering in his chest as he nears him and there’s a brief, futile moment before he opens his mouth that he thinks he must have gone absolutely mad.

“Walk me to my car, Alfie?”

Alfie’s head shoots up. His moustache twitches. “Yeah, alright. What for?”

“Need help carrying something back inside, it’s in the trunk.”

He looks bemused at the obvious lie, but mostly concerned. He’s sharp though, Tommy knows as much, and he probably figures that Tommy has a good reason for asking so he follows, grumbling under his breath.

Tommy leans against his trunk in the car park, pulling his cigarettes from his bag. Alfie stands warily in front of him, waiting.

“What’s this about, then, Tommy?” that’s the first time Alfie has ever called him that.

Tommy takes a cigarette from the pack, lights it and takes a long drag and insistently ignores his fluttering pulse. “You ever been to prison, Alfie?”

Alfie’s eyes flicker. “This about your little moustachioed friend then, innit?”

“Yeah. It is.”

“Alright, yeah, maybe I have. And maybe that means that you asking me to come out here with you was a stupid, foolish, _bad_ fucking idea.”

Tommy takes another drag. “I’ve made worse.”

“So what did you ask me to come out here for then, eh? Because I know his type, and I know the rules, and I damn well know men with big, sorry eyes like you are prone to self sabotage and if that’s what this is I want no part in it.”

Tommy has nothing to say to that because he realizes that he doesn't _really_ know why he asked Alfie to come out here with him. He could have just stayed away from Alfie for the next few weeks, let it go, not asked him to confirm or deny it.

"Just wanted to be sure, is all."

"Yeah, well, I would've very well told you inside, Tom, where you and I having a conversation would be normal. Damned if I care if anyone in there would give a shit about my sordid past, alright, so for future reference you keep your little parolee arse away from me unless it's taking my order or making my drink. That clear, sweetheart?"

Tommy pretends not to notice his heart do something peculiar at the pet name. "Is that why you've been avoiding me?" he asks. He says it without a single real thought, which terrifies him. Maybe he just felt taken aback by the “sweetheart”. Why would he care if Alfie was avoiding him? Or why? And why did he sound so petulant saying it? Alfie narrows his eyes at him contemplatively. It feels like maybe he's seeing a truth that Tommy himself isn't even aware of, and it raises his hackles.

"Y'know, I've always much preferred dogs to cats.” Alfie starts, “See, a dog, a dog is always honest. You feed him shit food and scratch behind his ear a few times and if he decides he likes you he probably tells you with his tail, if he's got one, and maybe he even barks excitedly when you get home from work." Tommy has no idea what the fuck he’s is on about suddenly, but he keys in sharply, waiting to catch the thread of meaning. "And if you kick him then he'll let you know how he feels about that, too. Angry or scared or sorry. The dog feels his way and shows you what that is."

Tommy swallows thickly.

"Cats though, they're complicated, ain't they? One second they’re convinced you’re out for their blood, the next they’re staring up at you while you sit in your armchair with those big, shiny eyes, waiting to be invited into your lap. Personally, I, right, am convinced that a cat doesn’t really _know_ how he feels. Perpetually affronted, emotionally stunted creatures who don’t care if their confusion as to the motives of others is justified or not. Horribly offensive, I find it.”

Alfie takes half a step closer and Tommy ironically finds himself wanting to lean both in and away. “I’m not a cat.”

“Not a cat, not an horse, never met a human like you so I’m not sure that’s quite accurate, either.”

There’s a hundred thoughts floating in and out of Tommy’s mind and he can’t grasp a single one of them, can’t find a clever quip and not even a casual out from the conversation, is just frozen there under Alfie’s gaze. And then Alfie turns back for the cafe without another word, all uneven gait and tense shoulders. Tommy notices his fists are clenched.

-

A few weeks go by, Alfie on his best behavior with Tommy but as insufferable as usual with everyone else, and Tommy feels absolutely left out. The thought comes to him while he’s lying in bed one night, trying not to think about Alfie’s hands or, more specifically, his fingers. ‘It’s not fair,’ he thinks, and immediately kicks himself. Why does he find himself wanting to be annoyed when he spent so many weeks loathing it?

Damn it, he is _not_ a confused cat, not _emotionally stunted_ , at least not in that way. Affronted, sure, but who wouldn't be with Alfie treating him like that? He tells himself this repeatedly, forces himself not to think back on the massive social and romantic failures riddling his life like potholes, and especially not the ones involving men. That night he finds himself half asleep, dreaming about being a cat in Alfie’s lap.

It’s one week until his parole is over and no one has mentioned it to him, and so he hasn’t mentioned it to anyone back. Nothing spectacular waits for him on the other side, with the exception of never having to see Mosley again and maybe getting a different job, and so really it doesn’t feel worth mentioning anyway.

Until Alfie walks into the cafe early that Monday and absolutely beams as he talks to some man he’s brought with him. Tommy’s irritation rises in an instant. Alfie never comes in with anyone. If he’s honest, Tommy assumed he was absolutely friendless (save for his own coworkers, who’ve apparently fallen deep under his spell).

He’s working the register and so he has to be painfully aware of the fact that Alfie pays for the man’s drink, and he also has the unfortunate opportunity to notice that the man’s got lazy blue eyes to rival his own. Tommy makes brief eye contact with Alfie and finds himself fucking _glaring_ for no good reason, which in turn irritates him that much more.

They sit together for nearly two hours, chatting and fucking laughing, before the man leaves. Tommy strains his ears over the din of the shop to hear him say “let’s do this again, Alfie” and to hear Alfie respond affirmatively, and wholly regrets it because he spends the rest of his shift thinking about it.

Was it a date? It looked like a date, the way they were both leaned over the table, talking about literature and dogs or whatever Alfie loves to talk about. Was it a first date? Had they been dating for a long time and Alfie had just never brought him here before? If that was a date that meant Alfie wasn’t straight, and that knowledge does something unsettling to his gut. Maybe they were just good friends, is all. Tommy finds himself confusedly hoping so.

When Tommy is leaving for the day he stops at Alfie’s table, hovering with his hands in his pockets until he’s noticed. After a few long moments Alfie breathes a long sigh out his nose and glances up at the ceiling like he’s asking what he did to deserve this.

“Thomas-”

“My name is _Tommy_ , Alfie.”

“ _Tommy_. Did I not tell you just the other day to stay away from me, considering my very dangerous and questionable past, and considering your own predicament?”

“It ends in a week.” Tommy spits out before Alfie can ramble any more. And that, that gets Alfie’s attention. His eyes flash and he actually sits up a little straighter, almost like he wants to stand up or make a mad dash or something.

“That so?” He asks, gaze scrutinizing and distrustful.

“Yeah. Sunday,” Tommy runs his tongue against his bottom teeth nervously, “it’s over on Sunday morning.”

“Sunday, eh?”

“Sunday.”

Alfie’s eyes crinkle at the corners and Tommy recognizes that he’s smiling patiently at him as opposed to just squinting. Tommy clicks his tongue, steeling himself with a slow breath.

“Do you want to,” oh, god, he was really doing this “grab lunch with me?” He tries his absolute best to sound perfectly confident, makes a point to not fidget or do anything telling with his mouth like he tends to do around Alfie.

“Lunch? You eat? Assumed you only occasionally pecked at a handful of seed or some such, tiny as you are. Thought maybe your bones were hollow and so you might not need all the nutrients, what with you only having to carry around the whole ten pounds of yourself-”

“A bird now, am I?”

“Quite possibly, mate, yeah, though I still haven’t decided yet. I’ll have to do some further research on that to come to a conclusion, being a man of reason and all. Sunday, perhaps?” Alfie suggests, pretending that he’s simply plucked the day from thin air.

Tommy tries his hardest not to smile, he really does, but he fails miserably after only a moment. It’s not an outright grin, not even close, but it’s so genuine that he’d forgotten what that kind of smile felt like on his face.

-

On Tuesday, Tommy closes with Bryony, who pleasantly announces when the cafe is fifteen minutes until close to the remaining patrons, Alfie included. Tommy finds himself glancing up as he rinses glasses, unable to keep his eyes off of Alfie for some reason. He spent the entire day, as well as the night before, wondering why in god’s name he’d basically asked the man out.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to, he’s realizing. He obviously wants to. He just wasn’t entirely aware of that want until the moment he saw Alfie with another man, which is disconcerting and thoroughly embarrassing, not to mention stupidly jealous. It all must say something about his relationship with attraction or romance or whatever, but he was _not_ about to try to parse out exactly what that something was.

Alfie is still firmly tucked into his book when Bryony calls out that the cafe now closes in five minutes. He doesn’t even glance up, which mostly annoys Tommy, but the idea of Alfie refusing to leave until he absolutely has to makes his stomach do a disgustingly pleasant flip.

Tommy wants to go over and make sure Alfie knows that he needs to leave, that he should gather his various books and papers and such now, but he stops himself because he isn’t even fucking sure if it’s the annoyance or the stomach-flipping urging him to go over there. Suddenly, Tommy hasn’t felt so neurotic in his life, not even when picking up his antipsychotics at the prison nurse's sterile little window.

Bryony rounds the counter when it’s officially closing time, obviously giddy that she gets the chance to talk to Alfie, which _annoys_ Tommy, which in itself annoys him even worse. He's noticing a pattern.

“Alfie,” she chimes happily, “sorry but it looks like it’s closing time! I’ll take your dishes if you’re finished.” Alfie looks up and around the cafe as if he hadn’t noticed everyone had gone or what time it was and Tommy can’t figure how genuine it is.

“Right, hadn’t noticed the hour! Too absorbed in my book here, ‘spose. I’ll pack up and bring my cup to Tom, no need to burden yourself with my foolishness.” He smiles up at her through his stupid beard and Tommy rolls his eyes. Bryony all but skips happily back to the counter while Tommy continues cleaning up, simultaneously dreading and waiting eagerly for Alfie to bring his cup and saucer up.

Of course he waits until Bryony has popped into the back momentarily to do so, and Tommy’s heart pounds in his chest while he pretends not to notice.

“That man I brought in yesterday,” Alfie begins. Tommy flicks his eyes toward him lightning quick as he keeps cleaning, enough to let him know he’s listening but not long enough to seem like he cares about the stupid fucking man that Alfie had come in with. “It was a first date, you know. Nothing serious.”

“I don’t care, Alfie.” Tommy spits.

“Right, right, ‘course.” Alfie says, sliding his dishes further onto the counter than necessary. It’s only when Alfie leans forward with one hand that Tommy notices he’s got a book tucked under his arm. Unfortunately, Alfie sees Tommy notice and decides that this is a great opportunity to be… Alfie.

“Oh, yeah, Void, it’s called. The book. All about the idea of "nothing", and what that might actually be, right? What nothing really consists of.” He says it with a little spark of wonder to his voice, like he’s rehearsed this all to say in a lecture, only Tommy now realizes that that’s how he always sounds.  
“See imagine an empty house,” Tommy clenches his jaw because he really needs to step away to put something in a different fridge but now Alfie is roping him into an already intolerable conversation. And what’s worse is that Tommy finds himself a little intrigued anyway.

“You take all the furniture out, people too, scrub it up and down, empty as you can get it. That’s empty right?”

“I suppose so, depending-”

“Right well what about the air, then? That’s something, yeah? Oxygen.”

Tommy levels a gaze at him, giving in and resting a hip against the counter. He’s not going to encourage him, really he won't, but he is woefully listening despite knowing where this is going.

“So say that you take that out, all the air and dust and everything. Now it’s empty, yeah?” Tommy raises his eyebrows almost imperceptibly. “Wrong again, though, right, ‘cause there’s still all sorts of things in there, light and radio waves for one, a gravitational field, it goes on. Lot of physics talk and chatter about a “quantum vacuum” and such.”

Tommy lifts his head in acknowledgement, a sort of nod that he hopes says ‘good for you’ and not ‘tell me more’ even though he finds himself wishing that it was Sunday already so that he might hear Alfie drone on about nonsense a bit longer.

-

Tommy doesn’t so much wake up Sunday morning as he does decide it’s time to stop trying to sleep. It’s five o’clock and Mosley is set to arrive at eight, although he’s always early whenever he has to come to Tommy’s house. He’s wondered repeatedly over the months what the dawn of this day would be like and, unsurprisingly, it feels like any other day, at least initially.

He drinks his tea at the kitchen counter, staring at the morning sky peeking through his curtains. Time seems to stretch on more than usual, which is saying quite a bit, and Tommy tries his best to distract himself with getting ready for the day. He’s set to see Alfie only a few hours after Mosley leaves, and finds himself being especially meticulous with his shave because of it, which embarrasses him for a moment until he reminds himself that he’s just fucking _into_ the man for god’s sake, of course he’s going to fret over these things. The thought refuses to settle in his mind, bubbling around in his chest instead. Alfie. What an absurd bastard to be attracted to.

Mosley arrives ten minutes early, which Tommy has anticipated. There’s a pot of tea prepared and waiting on the counter, a dash of cream in Tommy’s cup, nothing in Mosley’s. He opens the door within seconds of Mosley’s knock.

“Thomas, good morning.” Mosley smiles, poisonous and unnerving as usual.

“Good morning, Mosley.”

“Today’s the day, my boy.”

Tommy moves aside, “Come in.” Like inviting a vampire across your threshold.

They sit at the counter, or rather Mosley sits while Tommy stands, and go over a banal series of questions that Tommy can answer without even really paying attention. People prodding at your life becomes a bit monotonous when you’re an addict, even when you’ve stopped using, it seems.

“Mind if I take one last look around, just for good measure, Thomas?” Mosley asks, setting his empty cup on the counter.

“Be my guest.” Tommy answers, starting to get just a bit eager because this must mean that Mosley is almost set to leave.

Mosley takes his time poring over Tommy’s house. He doesn’t touch anything, rather leans in close with his hands behind his back, and Tommy wonders if it’s because he’s not technically allowed to touch. He inspects Tommy’s bookshelf, staring intently as if he’ll find a little bag of dope between his books or behind his framed photograph of his fucking dead mother.

He makes his way to Tommy’s bedroom, the only remaining room in the house besides the bathroom, and Tommy doesn’t follow. There’s nothing in there for him to see, or anywhere, and Tommy doesn’t want to think about how Mosley always acts like there’s going to be. Instead, he stares into the last dregs of tea in his cup, willing the debris to bring him a useful vision.

“Too bad.” Mosley pipes up from the other room.

Tommy clenches his jaw. ‘Too bad,’ as if he’s actually disappointed that he hadn’t found anything. And Tommy figures that he probably is, the sadistic monster. Except, when Mosley walks back into his kitchen he’s holding up an unmistakable little waxed paper bag, a garish little logo stamped onto it. A bag of fucking heroin. A wave of dread washes over Tommy, so intense that it feels like his brain might overfill his skull.

“So close, weren’t we, but you just couldn’t wait one more day, hm?”

Tommy’s tongue feels thick and his throat bobs helplessly. His voice comes out weak and irregular. “That’s not mine. That’s not fucking mine.”

Mosley gives him this sort of smile, something like a mix between knowing and pity, like you might give a child. “Mmm, isn’t that what they all say.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for all the support on this!
> 
> first, i wanna say since i know some of u are wondering: i have intentionally left pieces of background information out so far, and _may_ or may not continue to do so. something that i like both about real life and about certain writing styles is that sometimes things just don't come up immediately, if they ever do. sometimes also, writing certain conversations doesn't feel necessary to me, and i prefer to imply that maybe these conversations have been had and maybe they haven't. as someone who has Lived A Life, i enjoy writing and reading content that feels sort of natural in that way to me! i put a lot of myself and personal life and experiences into my writing and i hope that's apparent when i make those kinds of decisions.
> 
> second, i thought it might be funny to tell y'all that the void book alfie is reading is a real book that we have in our house. my partner works in/tangentially to publishing and so we snag a fair amount of advanced reading copies, one of them being "void: the strange physics of nothing" by james owen weatherall. i was rooting through our books and told my partner i was trying to find a sort of insufferable but still pretty interesting book for alfie to start rambling at tommy about and he picked out that one. although, it made us realize we have quite a few of those kinds of books. i could probably write a whole series about alfie bothering tommy with books from my own collection lol....


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHOO BOY. i had a series of just truly awful life things happened that took me through six different states and back and needless to say i just had no time or brain power to edit/write/post. but i'm back and i'm ready to finish this thing!!  
> thanks so much for all the comments and patience and kudos and everything i love yall

A few hours later, Alfie pulls up in front of his building. Tommy tosses his barely-smoked cigarette to the ground, not even bothering to stub it out. He wrenches the passenger door open before Alfie has been stopped for even a few seconds, closing it with shaky hands.

“Afternoon, sweetheart.” Alfie says pleasantly.

Only, Tommy can barely register the words because he’d spent the last three hours attempting to contain himself and hearing Alfie’s voice sends everything abruptly cascading down around him all at once. He curls in on himself, as much as Alfie’s car allows, and clutches at his hair so hard that it makes his arms tremble.

“Tommy?” Alfie questions, obviously concerned. Tommy desperately wants to say something but the only sound he can manage is a pained, animalistic growl.

“Tommy, what the fuck’s going on, eh?” Alfie pleads, sounding more distressed now. He puts the car back into park and Tommy shakes his head.

“Drive, Alfie, please fucking drive.” He begs, his voice thickening with tears. Alfie complies.

-

They drive for what must be at least an hour, Alfie understanding that lunch plans were off without Tommy having to say anything at all. Tommy spends almost the entirety of the drive with his head in his hands, trying to breathe evenly but unable to maintain it for more than a minute or two at a time. Calm eludes him in a painfully familiar way.

Alfie doesn’t attempt to talk to him, is in fact completely silent except for angry remarks at traffic and pedestrians under his breath, although Tommy suspects Alfie’s subdued road rage actually stems from nervousness about what he might say when he’s composed himself. The words repeatedly threaten to make their way up his throat, but each time fall miserably or turn into loud, shuddering breaths.

By the time they’ve stopped, Tommy is lightheaded from his pathetic attempts at breathing himself calm. He doesn’t look up when Alfie puts the car in park, or even when he gets out of the car. He does, however, look up when a moment later Alfie is opening his door for him.

“Alright, treacle, come along, can’t sit with your hands mashed into your eyeballs for the rest of your life, can you?” Alfie holds out a hand, standing up straight and brave like a perfect gentleman. Tommy somehow recognizes this as trying to comfort him and, alarmingly, it seems to work just a bit as he takes his hand.

Tommy squints into the afternoon light, eyes poorly adjusted, to find that they’ve landed in front of a small lodge of some sort, backed by a thick wood.

“My favorite park in London. When I’m not loitering in your fine establishment this is one of the places you might be able to find me, you look hard enough.” Alfie still holds his hand gently, as if he might need any more support, and Tommy slips away from him self-consciously. He’d never held a man’s hand in public before. This doesn’t seem to phase Alfie.

“Come on then, I’ll show you all the best spots, yeah, hidden away from all the old geezers and screeching children with their underpaid nannies.” Alfie starts walking down a broad path and Tommy follows, feeling entirely lost in at least a few different ways.

Alfie was right about the geezers and the children, it seems. The wood is busy on a Sunday and Tommy finds himself cowering on Alfie’s opposite side, up against the edge of the path so as not to expose his ruddy, exhausted face to any unassuming strangers.

Eventually, though, the people seem to thin out along with the path, and Tommy finds he has to walk behind Alfie or risk dirtying his trousers in the undergrowth. He thinks back to his childhood, barefoot and ravenous and unafraid of things like dirtying his trousers.

Alfie brings him to a small clearing next to a pond, small enough that if he looks across it Tommy can just catch glimpses of other people, but large enough that there’s no way for them to be overheard. It’s finally quiet in here, away from the voices and the city.

They sit on a wide log up against the trees, Alfie steering him over with a hand on the small of his back.

“Right, so, the fact that you climbed into my car tells me that you aren’t wholly opposed to seeing me, despite whatever may have happened before my arrival, so I’m assuming you’ll probably tell me what it was that’s upset you like this, if I ask.” There’s a pause then, but Tommy gets the sense that Alfie isn’t done talking. He waits for a moment, waits for him to ask or to say anything else. “And, also, I’d like you to know that, whatever it was that’s happened, I’d like to help, if I can. And if I can’t I’d like to at least distract you, alright? For a while.”

For some reason the words make Tommy want to cry, which enrages him because only a few weeks ago he thought he loathed Alfie, but here he is almost reduced to tears simply because the man is trying to comfort him. Maybe Alfie was right, maybe he is a bloody cat.

“Well? Are you going to ask?” Tommy mutters, staring at the sun reflecting off the water.

Alfie clears his throat. “Thomas, foremost barista and bearer of my americanos, my cantankerous infatuation, what has happened that’s made you so unhappy?”

Tommy grinds his teeth a bit, willing himself to spit it out. He isn’t sure what kind of trouble Alfie’s been in in the past, knows that whatever it is this probably won’t be that catastrophic to him, crown tattoos considered, but he still finds himself scared of what Alfie will think.  
Will he believe him? What if he’d never been into drugs? Never done or dealt them? Tommy finds it unlikely but… would he look down on him for it? After all the times people in his life had had to find out about his drug running, or the addiction that followed, it still scared the piss out of him.

“My Parole Manager planted heroin in my house. Told me that unless I agree to get him quite a lot of money that he’d send me back inside.”

Alfie whips his head around to look at him and Tommy can tell even from his peripheral vision that he’s got an absolutely mad look in his eye. It sends a thrill running through him, and also a bit of guilt, but most of all it has him feeling grievously apprehensive. He braces himself for a thousand questions.

“When is he expecting the money?”

For some reason this response throws Tommy. He was sure that Alfie was going to drill into him, ask about why he was in prison in the first place, ask about heroin, ask if he was lying. Instead, he sounded nothing but casually determined.

“He didn’t say. Don’t think he’s expecting it immediately but he does expect my answer by this evening. Think he’s going to have me do some dirty work for him if I can’t get it all to him soon, which he knows I can’t. Think he’s trying to rope me into something like a fucking caught animal.” Tommy pauses just to unclench his fists. “But he expects my answer by this evening.” he repeats.

“How much money are we talking?” Alfie asks and again Tommy is surprised. For the first time, Tommy truly feels like he’s talking to a former criminal. Only, he’s realizing now that he’s merely assumed the “former” part.

“Two hundred thousand pounds.” He breathes.

There’s a silence while Alfie considers this, Tommy can all but hear his brain working. His eyes are starting to strain from staring at the bright light on the water and he finds himself looking down at his clasped hands instead, trying not to push a response even if he very much wants to.

“Right, well, look at me, Tommy,” Alfie starts and Tommy looks up at him, except he’s hard to look at, all serious and intense and a complete fucking mystery, “I want you to think long and hard about your answer to what I’m about to say. Though, I ‘spose not too long as we’re on a bit of a time limit, but I want you to really consider it. Alright?”

Tommy nods minutely, looks back and forth between Alfie’s blue-green eyes.

“I am, you see, retired, effectively. I don’t do business anymore, for better or for worse. But, leftover from my business days, I’ve got loads of money strewn around in various unsavory bank accounts. Combined with the neat little sum of money I’ve recently come into selling my modest estate down in Margate, I’ve got more than enough to cover your arse.

Now, calm down, I see that look in your eye and I’m not finished, yeah? Fucking listen. I’ve got no family, all my friends are either in prison, still in the business, or dead, and I live in a tiny flat alone with my dog. That’s more money than I know what to do with, and- I said calm down, Tommy,”

Tommy has suddenly stood and started pacing in the grass because Alfie cannot possibly be about to offer what he thinks he’s about to offer. And if he is, he’s going to expect something back from him, work or, or something, and Tommy can’t, he’s just gotten out, he can’t possibly,

“Oi! Listen to me, Thomas!” Alfie barks and Tommy wants to lash out at him, punch him or yell at him or- Alfie stands and stops him in his tracks, grabs both of his wrists like he knows Tommy wants to fight.

“I’ve got no bloody reason not to give it to you. What the fuck else would I do with it, eh?”

“Yeah and what do you get out of it, hm?” Tommy spits, not even attempting to pull his wrists away.

Alfie furrows his brow and purses his lips. It’s an absurd face he has, too handsome for his own good.

“I’m going to forgive you this once Tommy, simply because maybe you don’t know me well enough yet, but I am not a fucking dirty, bloodsucking scoundrel, alright? I am not asking you for anything. You could pass off the money and disappear into the fucking ether and I wouldn’t try to stop you doing it.” Alfie snaps, throwing Tommy’s wrists out of his grasp. The motion makes Tommy teeter backward a bit. “I don’t bloody want anything from you, at least not for money. Fuck’s sake. You let me do this for you and I’ll leave you alone, if that’s what you’d want.”

_If that’s what you’d want_ , he says, and Tommy realizes that that’s not what he would want, not what he wants. He doesn’t want to go back to prison and he doesn’t want to disappear to become Mosley’s dog and he doesn’t want Alfie to give him the money and then disappear because he wants to see _more_ of Alfie. He wants to go back to his stupid fucking job at the stupid fucking cafe and serve Alfie three Americanos a day and have him incessenatly pester him all the while.

The realization makes his ears burn hot and the only response he can muster is gripping Alfie by the shirt and wrenching him closer, to fight or to kiss or to scream at, he isn’t sure. Alfie doesn’t appear to be sure either, the way he grips Tommy’s biceps, tense and waiting.

“Let me do this for you, and I’ll be out of your hair. No strings attached, nothing. Find a new cafe even, I will.” Alfie says lowly, his breath ghosting against Tommy’s lips.

“You insufferable fuck.” Tommy all but whispers. He crushes his mouth against Alfie’s then, hard and fast and unrelenting and he doesn’t even think once if anyone across the pond can see it.

-

Tommy calls the number Mosley gave him from the car. It’s a burner phone, Tommy understood that when Mosley gave him the number. As it’s ringing, he puts it on speakerphone and Alfie, sitting stock still beside him, sets his phone to record. If for some reason this all falls through, a recorded phone call might be his only hope at saving himself. Might not work, but it’s worth a shot.

Mosley answers vaguely, impatiently. He doesn't fall for Tommy's obvious attempts at getting him to incriminate himself, to reveal his identity. Of course he isn't so stupid. They negotiate, if you can call it that, for only a few minutes before the phone call abruptly ends, before Tommy manages to get anything else out of him.

He supposes he won't hear from him directly again, will probably just deal with being stalked and bothered by various unsavory lackeys until he’s paid all the money. Honestly, it sounded far better than having the man himself lurking around unpredictably. Alfie stops the recording and tosses his phone haphazardly into a cupholder.

“What a bastard. An absolute fucking villain.” He spits quietly, sounding more mad than Tommy himself even.

“We should talk about how this is going to work.” Tommy says, staring in a daze at the overly-quaint lodge across the car park.

“Don’t worry about it, alright, it’ll take a bit but I’ll get the money all into-”

“Not that, Alfie.”

Alfie looks well and truly puzzled for a moment, staring at for a long moment before it hits him.

“Oh. You mean _this_.” Alfie gestures between them.

A blush creeps up Tommy’s neck and ears. “I had the full intention of going on a date with you this afternoon, and now the potential of having any sort of normal relationship, in any capacity, seems a bit…” Tommy trails off.

“Problematic.” Alfie supplies.

“Yes. Problematic. I don’t often start things off so deeply indebted to someone.”

“Right, well, I told you I don’t expect anything. You want me to get out of your hair, I will.” Alfie looks like he’s trying his best not to pout and it’s horrendously endearing.

“I don’t fucking want you out of my hair, Alfie. That’s the problem. If I wanted to take the money and never see you again I would. It would be easier even, but that’s not what I want.” Alfie’s lips twitch a bit at that, like he wants to smile only can’t quite manage it yet. “The problem is, whatever becomes of you and me, there will always be _this_ between us. Regardless of how things go, we can’t take this back. Ever.”

Alfie barks out a short laugh. “Well I’m sorry to break it to you, mate, but not only are your options slim but it’s my very own money and I’m going to utilize it how I see fit, alright? If that’s helping out a stranger, or a friend, or an inamorato, or my bloody barista, then that’s my choice and they shouldn’t feel any way about it at all after they say their thank yous. Can’t take it back, like you said, so there’s no use in fretting over it in any case.”

Tommy considers this, looks intently at Alfie like he might be able to tell the future through his face like a crystal ball. Alfie reaches out and perches Tommy’s chin in one of his big hands, thumb gliding across his cheek.

“And if I ever lose each and every one of my marbles and try to hold it against you, for whatever ungodly reason, in any way, you’ve full license to shoot me square in the head. Alright?”

Tommy smiles despite himself, despite the nervousness and the disbelief and everything else. What a truly horrible, wonderful man Alfie turned out to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> not sure when the next chapter will be it could be one day it could be a few weeks i'm sorry i have no control over my brain at the moment :)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> everyone. listen. i know i said.. a day or a few weeks for this last chapter. and now i don't even know how long it's been, and i'm not going to check, bUT..... in the wise words of smash mouth the world starts comin' and it don't stop comin'. the world really just did not stop comin' there for a while. here's a last chapter.
> 
> it's far less horny and far more disgustingly sappy than i thought it would be, but it's been a long few months and this is just what poured out of me in like two hours. it is what it is. i slammed this out super fast, read it through probably one and a half times. if there are errors lemme know pleeease.
> 
> thanks for all your patience. and for reading. hope you are all doin' okay <3

EPILOGUE

Tommy finishes taping his last box. He’s wearing the same trousers as yesterday because he forgot to leave a pair out, the box with his clothes in it now long buried beneath the remainder of his meager kitchen. His hair is tousled in a way that must be less-than-attractive, and he’s covered in a thin sheen of sweat from finally tackling his bookshelf.

And yet, when Alfie lets himself into the apartment, he looks like he’s never seen anything better in his life. “Today’s the day, Thomas.”

They’ve been fucking for six months and still Alfie only calls him ‘Tommy’ about ten percent of the time. More irritating than that though is the fact that Tommy has adjusted by now, almost _enjoys_ it even. “That it is, Alfie.” He stands, shooing what dust he can from his pants.

Alfie is just stood there, a carrier with one coffee and one tea in one hand and a bag of lunch in the other, just _beaming_ at him like an idiot. “We going to eat, or are you just going to stand there and watch me pack?”

After their sandwiches, Tommy stands to grab the first box to load into the truck in the car park. Only, he gets just a meager step away before Alfie is dragging him back by the hips, pulling him into his chest so he can push him against the counter.  
  
“Alfie, we only have the moving rental for a few hours.”  
  
“Yeah, and I’m only on this earth for a few dozen years.” Alfie murmurs, pressing his beard against Tommy’s neck in a way that makes him curve his back against Alfie. “I never got to come fuck you in your own flat, paranoid about me being followed as you were, and I’m determined to do it while I’ve got the chance.”

Something Tommy has learned about himself in the last few months is that he quite _enjoys_ fucking. Sure, he’d had sex plenty before, sought it out often enough, thought he was enjoying it for what it was. Only, with Alfie, it’s different. He enjoys it in a whole, bone-deep, earth shattering way that he hadn’t before. Which, besides giving him an entirely new avenue of pleasure to explore, also meant that he could never quite convince himself to turn Alfie down.

“I’m filthy, Alfie. Covered in sweat and dust.” He knows it’s a weak attempt, knows it even as he presses his arse back into the swell of Alfie’s cock.

“May I remind you, sweetheart, that just last week I took you out to the countryside, watched you ride horses all bloody day, yeah, and still pulled off to the side of the fucking road so I could shove you into the back seat and get my cock in you, sweat and dirt and all? Eh?”

The memory has Tommy’s cock twitching in his trousers, heat rising quickly to his ears. His legs had been so tired after years without riding, but Alfie insisted that Tommy straddle him and fuck himself until he came, thighs trembling like a newborn calf. And the way he’d cradled him after, sickly sweet and sticking with cum in the back seat of a dark, quiet car in the country. Tommy hadn’t known it could be this way.

\---------------  
  
His new flat is much closer to Alfie’s, and much larger as well. Tommy is sure Alfie’s going to ask him to move in soon, could feel it sometimes when they talked, so he isn’t sure why he’d insisted on such a place. But another thing on the laundry list of things that Tommy had recently learned was that sometimes letting Alfie do what he pleased was simply the easiest course of action. It was a bonus that he enjoyed seeing Alfie’s eyes light with happiness whenever he agreed to one of his absurd ideas.

Alfie’s dog Cyril will be living with him, Tommy learns, only just temporarily until they’re sure no one is going to try to break in while he’s asleep. Tommy assures Alfie that since they’d finished paying Mosley off the month prior that they wouldn’t be hearing from him again, but Alfie insists it’s just a good idea. Tommy keenly remembers Alfie telling him that mastiffs were superior guard dogs, but looking at him now he can’t imagine it. He suspects the dog is simply another excuse to visit more often.

They spend the day loading and unloading boxes and Alfie only interrupts them once to strip off Tommy’s winter coat and make him cum in front of the fireplace, which shows considerable restraint on his part. Cyril explores the flat and Tommy says something to Alfie about giving the dog his own room, since the place is big enough.

Alfie stays the first night, insisting he’s too tired to drive home, despite the whopping five minute trip. Tommy doesn’t mention it as they crawl into bed, surrounded by boxes and piles of his belongings, Cyril sprawled comfortably near the door. Already, he felt more like home here than the parole board specified flat he'd been in for what felt like an eternity. Tommy guesses that's at least partially due to Alfie being there with him, pressed firmly along his back.

\---------------

Bryony opens the door for them a few weeks later, sky still dark with the winter dawn. Alfie takes his seat by the door and Tommy heads to the back to don his apron. Bryony pops her head through the doorway, voice awfully low. “You know, Tommy, I noticed that Alfie’s been driving you to the café recently…”

Tommy tenses. He knew this conversation would happen eventually, nosy as Bryony is. All he offers is a simple “Yeah.”

“Are you two, you know…”

Tommy rolls his eyes. For someone who loved to gossip as much as Bryony did, she sure wasn’t very succinct with these things. “Together?”

Her eyes widen, as if it was a forbidden thing to mention. Tommy wishes it was. He had never been one to talk about his personal life, and especially not with his coworkers. But, after all, he liked it here. Maybe he could start.

“We are, yeah.” He adjusts the buttons on his shirt, pretends to notice one askew. He can see the massive grin bloom on Bryony’s face, even only out of the corner of his eye.

“You know, I’m only a little bit disappointed. I fancied him at first, before I noticed he only had eyes for you.”

Tommy almost starts at that, but keeps his gaze firmly fixed on his buttons. Bryony had _noticed_? “Well, you’re more than welcome to try to steal him away, if you’d like. I know I’ve got a head start, but he likes dogs, Victorian furniture, and insufferably dated literature, if that helps your pursuits.”

Bryony barks a laugh and slaps a hand over her mouth in glee, almost stumbling forward where she’d been propping herself in the doorway. “Tommy, did you just make a _joke_?”

A small smile lights Tommy’s face and, for a brief moment, he finds himself able to make a sort of friendly eye contact with his coworker. Is this what normal people did every day? “Better go get ready for the day, I’m sure Alfie’s already wondering where his americano is, yeah?”

They start their day in a peaceful, quiet busyness, Bryony turning on a jazz station that, paired with the weather outside, felt cozy instead of chaotic. Tommy suspects Alfie still didn’t like it, but he’d stopped complaining about the music months ago, so maybe he was slowly coming around as well. Days like this made Tommy wonder if he’d hit his head and now lived in a distinctly more pleasant dream world parallel to his own.

He turns from a task to find Alfie propped at the counter, bent over on his forearms like he’d seen so many times before. “Large americano?” Tommy asks.

Alfie smiles up at him, “How’d you know, treacle?”

Tommy rolls his eyes at the pet name, but he’s long since stopped trying to hide the little smiles Alfie pulls from him at work. The look in Alfie’s eye when he finally slides the americano in his direction tells Tommy that he’s in some sort of mood this morning.

“You got cream back there?” Alfie chirps.

Tommy stares back with lowered eyelids, crosses his arms over his chest as he pointedly looks at the cream carafe across the room and back. Alfie raises his eyebrows and stares until Tommy gives in. “You really love to make my day more complicated, don’t you, Alfie?”

Alfie grabs the container cheerily as it's handed to him, dashing in what must be three entire drops of cream. “Nah, mate. Maybe at first I did, sure. Now I just like watching you bend over to get into that little fridge.”

And even as Tommy’s ears burn with irritation, and a bit of embarrassment (and fine also a smidge of arousal), he hopes that Alfie never stops bothering him.

**Author's Note:**

> comment pleeaaaasseeee i love comments
> 
> also follow me on tumblr!! url is my username here


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